Adventure Journalist Gear

Thinking Of Going Off The Grid For A Bit? This Is The Gear You Need First

Young children often say that they want to be firefighters or detectives when they grow up. What most of them really mean is they want to be adventure journalists. At least that’s what they’d say if Billy Brown came to career day.

Billy spends his “work” days traveling the globe, crossing off bucket-list adventures en masse, and reviewing gear that the rest of us won’t get our hands on for another year. He’s caved his way to ancient sacrifice sites in Belize, monkeyed around the American Ninja Warrior course in Venice Beach and heli-boarded bottomless powder in British Columbia — and that was just over the course of a few months. Yeah, he may never be a hometown hero plastered all over local papers, but it’s pretty damn good to be Billy Brown.

“I gotta say Jordan, Chamonix and Belize … like the big three,” Brown said when we asked for his best adventure, quickly interrupting himself, “No, no, no, nope, — heli-boarding might have been the best day of the year so far. It snow-stormed the day before; it was dumping that morning, and then we got like a five-hour window of sunlight just where we were. It was like chest-deep powder, no tracks whatsoever. It was just unreal.”

At home and abroad, Brown reviews all kinds of winter and summer gear for some of the biggest magazines in the industry, including Wired, Men’s Journal and Outside. He also runs his own gear blog, TrekTechBlog. So, what does a globe-trotting gear guru that can get his hands around pretty much any type of (free) new gear actually use in the field when the tests are over? We caught him between international flights to find out.

Lifeproof iPhone Case with ArmbandLifeproof’s cases are aimed squarely at athletes that need to stay in touch. They are submersible, dirt-proof, snow-proof and shock-proof; the only thing that will get broken is you. The addition of an armband makes the case portable for activities where you don’t have pockets, or don’t want a phone bouncing around in the pockets you do have.

“Lifeproof’s case, that’s something I use every day now. Just because it’s got that armband, and it’s perfect for running, and now that I’m swimming ‘cause I jacked my knee, I can have it there tracking me and doing all that stuff. And then same thing with taking photos, because that way I can just whip it out and take a picture of the shoes you’re running in or what my testers are up to.”

Switch Lycan SunglassesWeather is constantly changing, so it’s nice to have sunglasses that can keep up. Switch sunglasses have interchangeable lenses that swap out with the simplicity of magnets. There’s no bending, twisting or snapping involved — just pull and stick.

“I don’t get why they haven’t completely blown up. Number one, the lens switching — it totally works, it’s great, super-easy. And two, these are the toughest poly lenses I’ve ever seen. Every plastic pair of lenses I’ve had I’ve managed to scratch. I pop these things out and drop ‘em all the time. I’ve had these sunglasses — the Lycans — for I think maybe 10 months now, and there is not a mark on ‘em.”

Hoka One One Running Shoes“When I first saw ‘em, I was skeptical, I was like ‘I’m not running in these friggin’ moon boots! I don’t want to look like an idiot.’”

“But they’re the most comfortable shoes. When I was running a lot more, I was maybe 155, 160 pounds. Now that I’m doing more lifting and stuff like that I’m closer to 180, and [the Hoka One One] takes a lot of pressure off the joints. It absorbs a lot of the crappy trail, like scree and everything, and it doesn’t change your gait. It’s only got a 4-mm heel-toe drop, so you’ve got that shallow base.”

Brown isn’t the only one with a soft spot for moon runners. Ultrarunner Duncan Callahan also told us he likes these big, puffy foot-mallows. Hoka One One says that its oversized midsole geometry lets runners enjoy a more relaxed, comfortable run, while the rockered soles promote natural running mechanics.